


Emperah and Spy

by tielan



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-13
Updated: 2017-02-13
Packaged: 2018-09-24 04:26:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9701540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: A consort is for bringing up sons,said her mother, the Emperah that was.The concubini are for pleasure and release and a little fun. But lovers... A lover is a threat to you and to the empire.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theladyscribe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theladyscribe/gifts).



> Prompt was " _Queen/Royal Spy_ : a story about the queen and her spy whom she must love at a distance because he or she is constantly on missions or the spy can't be seen at the palace because that would blow their cover." I couldn't manage any of the historic locales that you mentioned, and so I've taken a fantasy world angle.

Her life is duty.

 _A consort is for bringing up sons,_ said her mother, the Emperah that was. _The concubini are for pleasure and release and a little fun. But lovers...a lover is a threat to you and to the empire._

_Lady Eirilla is in love with her husband, Sir Peng._

Her mother shook her head. _Lady Eirilla is heir to an estate that employs mere thousands. And her many estates are merely landownings. She will not be the Emperah, who must make political choices, who must seek the good of both the whole and the individual parts._

_But if I’m to seek the good of the individual parts, doesn’t that mean I get to seek something for myself?_

_You may try._ A wry and slightly sad look touched her mother’s features. _But it will always be taken from you – duty and responsibility and the empire are our beloved, my daughter. They should always come first. We are not a king, to treat our realm as though it were an extension of our ambition; we are Emperah, to watch over our people and see that they are benefited from the whole._

So she’s not supposed to fall in love.

 

A consort is easy – upbringing and bloodlines, combined with qualities she wishes to see in her sons: patience, kindness, goodness, strength that doesn’t rely on power, a willingness to challenge, but the ability to back down, too.

Concubini are even easier – a pretty face, a good body, the willingness to please and thank her and walk away without demanding favours.

Counsellors to advise her are rather more difficult; she keeps some of her mother’s trusted circle, but retires others whose vision she does not share. And there is always the politics, always the questions, always the trust.

And then there is the Master of Secrets.

 

The first time she meets him, he’s not the Master of Secrets, just a young man a handful of years older than herself, impatient with the news he carries, and, she gathers, stung by his relegation to babysitting the Princess. She considers calling out his rudeness, but chooses instead to listen to what he says rather than how he says it. A childhood of control and self-restraint assists her in hearing the point he is making, and an adolescence of growing political acumen helps her to ask the questions that matter.

Afterwards, he bows himself out, then pauses, turning back at the door.

“I was impolite before,” he says, and the sweep of forelock drifts darkly down over his brow like a curtain of shame. “I was—no, the reason doesn’t matter. Only that I was a boor. I beg pardon, Princess.”

She stares at him, long enough that he glances up at her from beneath the veil of his lashes, daring to peep, even as he requests forgiveness. It’s a challenge of composure, and she wins when his mouth twitches, belying the apology somewhat.

“Your insolence and your candor are noted. Grace is granted.”

Then she smiles, and is pleased to see him blink, before he smiles again.

 

Six weeks after her mother’s death – a swift sickness that hit hard and left the land in mourning – the Master of Secrets sends the signal requesting a meeting. She dresses as one of her own soldiers and slips from the palace with her guard, down to the brothel that is the meeting place for such things.

It’s nothing she hasn’t done before; only then, she did it as Princess, not Emperah.

It is as Emperah that she receives and accepts the Master’s resignation from his post and his recommendation for a replacement. It is as Emperah that she lifts a brow at the lean figure in the shadows, silent and accepting of his master’s retirement.

It is as Emperah that she accepts the new Master’s oath, his hands upturned on her knees, the ceremonial dagger of meteoric steel raising scarlet welts across his wrists.

His service is hers, his blood is hers, his life is hers.

She takes his hands and raises him, her secrets are his, her trust is his, her honor is his.

Such simple words, but as she looks down at him, they mean much more.

“Glad that’s done,” says the old Master, pouring her a goblet of watered wine before pouring his own. “This is a young man’s job – all the more in keeping up with a young Emperah, eh?”

“I shall need all my wits about me, Master,” says his successor, and the slip of his smile behind his beard is droll. “And then some.”

 

Is there anything that can stop war when the hounds bay for blood?

She reads through the report – bald news and disturbing – and presses her hands to her belly, feeling her child shift beneath her palms. “How many reports do we have?”

“Well over a dozen, and all of them confirmed – six of them myself.” He waves away her startled concern for his safety. “They’re mobilising for war – and while it might be on account of the insult from Holmalecht, the Callambians have never held us in great esteem. The current First Citizen doesn’t think much of women either – unless they’re in his bed and thinking only of him.”

“That would be an effort, I have no doubt.” Her mouth twists at the thought. “What do you recommend for the protection of the country, and what do you see as my alternatives?”

Between them, they hash out the baseline; with the addition of her most trusted councillors, they develop a working plan. It may not stop the war, but it may stave it off long enough for her child to be born.

By the end of it, she has a headache; but makes herself focus. This is about her people, about her kingdom, about the future she is building for the child she carries. Doesn’t she owe them a duty and a care?

She sees him slip out, of course. She’s been aware of him every moment of the evening’s discussion, watching, listening, observing everything, giving away nothing. He pauses at the door, and turns. Their eyes meet, and she gives him a slight nod, to which he returns a quiet smile.

The heat that rushes through her is merely the pregnancy. But when her personal carer comes in a moment later to check her blood pressure and her state of mind, she knows who sent her in.

 

In then end, it’s an uneasy peace, but it’s peace all the same.

She gives permission for the imperial army to recruit, but leaves the suggestion that each family tender a member as a mere suggestion rather than a law. She denies the petition that the Great Houses be exempted from such suggestions, and gently notes that the royal family has not one but two members in the army – and not all in command position, at that.

Yes, she rules an empire of power and influence and land, but she also rules a multitude of people who have the right to live life with a certain degree of freedom from upset and disturbance to their everyday lives, whether they beg for coins from a wheeled trolley, or beg for favours from the Emperah.

“Your family has always been unusual in that,” says the Master of Secrets one evening. “The word they have for it in Holmalecht means ‘carer of the people’ and it is rarely bestowed on any until after she has died. The Callambians, on the other hand, seem to believe that all leaders are despots, waiting to crush them into the ground. Even the ones they elect.”

“I know they oppose our Empire on the grounds that it is not a republic.”

It has been a source of contention, not only in Callambia, but in the empire, too, as dissidents demand a fractured, bureaucratic rule in place of a unified vision brought together for their benefit.

“They oppose our empire on the grounds that it has greater wealth, resources, and power than their own country,” he corrects her crisply. “The catchcry of ‘freedom’ calls the dogs to yapping, but it is the masters and not the dogs who would tear the choicest cuts from the empire’s bones had they the chance.”

She watches the way his lip curls as he speaks. He catches her watching and the curl of his lip turns to a curve. “I beg pardon, Emperah. My passion overwhelms my prudence.”

“Your work is not just a duty discharged, is it?”

His gaze flickers over her face, sober and studying. “No more than the care for your people is a duty, your grace.”

For a moment, she wonders if his passion overwhelms his prudence in other arenas. Then she puts that thought away. His service is hers, his blood is hers, his life is hers; she has no right to demand more of him, were he even willing to secede it. And always – _always_ – duty has the greatest claim on her life.

“The empire thanks you for your service.”

His lashes drop, eyes falling to the table, adam’s apple bobbing. “And I thank the empire for the opportunity _to_ serve.”

This time, when he lifts his lashes at her silence, his gaze is unveiled and unwary, like a robe dropped to the floor to expose naked soul.

 

She's not supposed to fall in love.


End file.
